Living is hard
by athena2517
Summary: The worst possible way to reach the best possible ending. S/J and team love. Wait until the ending, you'll like it.
1. Chapter 1

_Warning: this fic will tug at your heart strings. Bittersweet ending ahead. This is the fic that tells you the worst possible outcome of defeating the goa'uld. I do not own SG-1. _

Jack O'neill was alone in the room. The bag hanging from the ceiling swayed back and forth as he punched it for all he was worth. Sweat streamed down his face and arms. Every hit was punctuated by a curse in his mind. He was so _angry. _No matter what he did or how hard he tried he couldn't stop the images from flooding his mind.

Samantha Carter sat alone in her lab. Tears streamed down her face. She stared at her computer screen willing her brain to work. She couldn't focus, her mind kept going back to what had happened.

Teal'c sat alone in his room meditating. He dreamed of what had happened. He willed himself to get over it. It didn't work.

Daniel's room was empty. As if waiting for the wayward archaeologist to return. It had stood empty for a week. People couldn't bring themselves to enter, only stand at the door and look in until they could feel their hearts breaking.

The team had been sitting around a table in the mess silently after the funeral. Each of them had been lost in their own pain, avoiding the gazes of the people around them. The people looked at them and away, afraid to come face to face with the reality of their pain. Sam took a shaky breath in, "He's not coming back is he?" She said, her voice cracking in a sob at the end. "No," Jack replied, in the quietest of whispers, "No he's not." Teal'c's shoulders drooped just a fraction of an inch. For him that was like falling to the ground in tears. Sam reached out and held his hand, placing her other hand on Jack's shoulder. She remembered when it happened.

It had been chaos, a surprise attack by the goa'uld. They had thought that they had gotten all the Jaffa. They had been wrong. It only took one lucky shot by a dying warrior to hit Daniel so hard that his neck broke. It was so obvious, she knew right away that there was no saving him. She had fallen to her knees, _Oh, god, no. _Jack had yelled Daniel's name, rushing over to his side and kneeling next to him. Teal'c had carried him home as Daniel took his last trip through the stargate.

The team was quieter now, a new fourth member had yet to be assigned. She had a feeling Jack had intervened. He was good at that, sensing that the team wasn't ready. He always looked after them, now more than ever. Jack's hand was a fist on the table. At Sam's touch he slowly opened it and laid it on the table.

"We're going to win." Sam said. Teal'c looked into Sam's eyes, questioning. Jack turned his head slightly and said quietly, "What?" "We are going to win this war. The three of us are going to win it. For Daniel." "For Daniel." Jack repeated. "For Daniel Jackson." Teal'c repeated. The process of turning crushing grief into iron resolve started there. Jack embraced Sam, he was the only one who could, he loved that she could say just the right thing at times like this, when he was speechless. They needed each other, in so many ways, the whole team, they were nothing alone.


	2. Chapter 2

It was just the three of them, out on a mission. Daniel not being along was all too obvious. Sam kept expecting to hear sneezes from behind her from Daniel's allergies. Jack kept waiting for Daniel to start babbling about this ruin or that slab of rock, that to him, looked like a slab of rock but to Daniel looked like Christmas come early. Teal'c hoped that the inhabitants spoke the same language.

After a while, walking on the alien forest planet, Jack signaled for them to get down and crept slowly forward to peer down into a ravine. A goa'uld cargo ship was sitting at the bottom of the ravine. Jack turned to make sure they saw it. Sam nodded. Jack looked at Teal'c and was thrown off by the emotion that raged in his eyes. Rage was clear in his features. They pulled back. "All right, lets get back to the gate, we gotta tell Hammond maybe get some marines in here and kill these… you know what I'm just gonna leave what they are up to your imagination." "Yes, sir." Of course, since nothing ever goes as planned, jaffa swarmed in on them. Teal'c brought up his staff weapon but Jack shouted, "Teal'c! There are too many of them." Teal'c slowly lowered his weapon, a promise in his eyes.

"Take us to your leader!" Jack said with false cheer. "I'd like to say we come in peace, but the thing is, I'll shove a grenade up your ass the first chance I get." He smiled winningly at the surrounding jaffa as he and his team were lead away.

A few hours later the three of them sat, bruised in a cell. "Well, that went splendidly." Jack commented to the silent room." Sam looked up at him. "Sir, do we have a plan here?" He looked at her smugly, "Samantha! Of course we have a plan! Escape is a plan, it's a great plan!" She almost grinned. "Escape is the plan?" "Yup!" he answered cheerfully. "Escape and be home in time for the Simpson's! You like the Simpson's Carter?" "Sir, being around you for this long, I couldn't _not_ like the Simpson's." He grinned at her. "So, sir, about this escape plan of yours, mind if I add on to it?" "You go right ahead." He said.

As they had guessed it wasn't long before a guard came down to retrieve them. He opened the door and headed straight for Sam. "Yeah, that's gonna happen." Jack said and stepped in front of him. "The woman comes with me." The jaffa said. "Nope, sorry, she's taken." Jack said as the jaffa reached for his zat gun. Sam kicked him in the face. Hard. His nose cracked and blood spurted down his face. Before he could yell jack knocked him out. "That's what I call teamwork." Sam commented. They made their way down the halls of the mother ship they had landed on. As always they easily got past the extremely arrogant and oblivious guards and servants to the area where their weapons were kept.

Armed well enough to take out a small country they tried to find the best spot to plant some nice, friendly C4. They planted it just below the bridge, to take out some high level goa'uld and jaffa and hopefully destroy the ship. They attached the C4 to the ceiling by standing on some crates. Sam, on the off chance that someone found the C4 got out the Sharpie. Jack glanced up at the marked C4 and nodded his approval. They turned and left behind the explosives marked: _for Daniel_.

They made their way to the opposite end of the ship and set one lone C4 It was set on a shorter timer and served as a very good distraction as they ran to the hanger deck, shooting anyone who got in their way.

They burst through the hanger doors and proceeding to dispose of the jaffa inside. "Let's bring Hammond home a present shall we?" Jack asked as he eyed a cargo ship. "We can't bring that through the gate." Sam pointed out, as earth was too far away to make it in just a cargo ship. "That's not what I meant. We can land it on a planet with a gate and have the guys have a little stress-relieving time beating the crap out of it." "Sounds like a good idea to me." Sam said with a smile and went out on a limb, "Sir, What did you mean when you said I was taken?" Teal'c was already at the helm and did not make a move to answer Sam's question. "Well, ummm… Carter. What I meant was that, umm… you're a part of our team and, umm…" Loud beeping noises from the console got him off the hook. "The doors will not open O'neill." Teal'c said calmly. "What?" O'neill yelped. "Hold on a minute, I can activate it from outside!" Sam climbed out of the cargo ship and stood at the console. She ran her fingers over the controls and froze. A warning lit up: _Shields are offline, do not attempt to open doors._ Her heart beat rapidly. This was the only way to open them. She looked up through the windshield at her teammates. Jack gave her a "what?" look.

Jack stood in the front of the cargo ship, watching as Sam's beautiful face paled. She looked up at them, fear in her eyes. "What?" he tried to ask through the glass. Sam's blonde head bent back down to look at the controls. She yelled, loud enough that he could just hear her, "I am so sorry!" She cried and flipped a switch. The whole ship gave a jerk as the doors started to open. He started to say good job, now get back inside when the cargo ship flew backwards. The hanger deck was open to space. "Sam!" Jack cried. As he was thrown back onto the floor. Everything in the hanger deck flew out into open space as the mother ship exploded, including the cargo ship. Including Sam.

The explosion was chaos, fire, metal. The aftermath was silence. The kind of silence that pounds in your ears, making you want to scream, anything to make some noise. "Colonel O'Neill." Teal'c was staring at Jack's face, as it got paler and paler. _She's gone._ The words spun around in Jack's head. Then the echo, _he's gone. _No, not two teammates. It was too cruel. "Colonel, are you injured?" "No," The silence begun again. Teal'c checked the ship for damage, then started it up. He sat at the console and started to fly away. "Where are we going?" Jack asked, not really caring. "I believe the Tok'ra have a base nearby." _Jacob, oh god._ Jack laid down on the floor, wishing he could just fall asleep there and never have to get up. Teal'c looked at his friend, now the closest friend he had. "Colonel, we must look forward to the mission ahead." Jack looked into Teal'c's eyes. "I loved her T." He said, lowering his forehead to the cold floor. "I too felt a strong bond with Samantha O'Neill." Teal'c replied. "THAT'S NOT WHAT I MEANT!" O'Neill bellowed. The anger, grief, and guilt swallowed him up. "I know." Was all Teal'c said.


	3. Chapter 3

Teal's pretended not to notice the few tears that escaped Jack's eyes. He knew that the man hated having his weaknesses on display. "What now, T?" "Now, Colonel O'Neill, we contact the Tokra and rain vengeance down on the false gods." "Sounds like a plan." Jack said, not really caring anymore, still half numb, although pain had started to spread from his heart.

They arrived at the Tokra base, Jacob was there. Jack stumbled from the cargo ship to come face to face with the beautiful Sam's confused father. "Jacob, I'm sorry." Jack managed, before he fled, he knew it was cowardice but he could not look Jacob in the face knowing that his only daughter had given her life to save him. Later he would feel bad about leaving Teal'c to deal with the grieving father, at that moment all he could think about was the pain.

They were back at the base within the hour, looking forward to psychiatric evaluations and a funeral. Again. What the hell were you supposed to do with half a team? Both the men had to face the staring eyes of the other SGC personnel. It was like they half expected for them to snap and start shooting up the place. Jack wasn't far from it, one more odd look, one more conversation stopped as he walked into the room and he'd be tempted to click the safety off. Neither man was aware of the passage of time before they started to hear whispers of the goa'uld stronghold. It was said that soon there would be a big meeting of the system lords. All the system lords in one building. Jack begged and pleaded with the general to let he and Teal'c lead some men to try to take them out. The General refused every time. There was obviously only one choice open to them. They went against orders. They arrived on the planet with the stronghold, not in the least bit scared of what lay ahead.

They discovered that it was a cakewalk getting into said stronghold if they didn't mind blowing up the entire entrance and walking through the burning wreakage. Once they got inside it was much more difficult. The system lords' guards were very picky about two very heavily armed men storming through the halls shooting everything in sight. "T, THEY'RE N THERE! GO! I'LL HOLD OFF THIS HAPPY BUNCH! " Colonel O'Neill yelled over the sound of weaponsfire. Teal'c ducked into the conference room, listened to the yelled objections from the stuck-up arrogant occupants of the room. He walked through the room like a god, no harm came to him although the system lords tried their best. He blocked off the door and laid down his burden. The nuclear bomb was ready for him to throw the switch. He bent his head over it, tears slid down his face at what he was about to do. "It's alright T, we're here for you." Teal'c looked up. Daniel was the first thing he saw, shining golden in the light of the ascended. He looked next to Sam and Jack, they had their arms around each other's eaists. Their other hands laid on the shoulders of a small boy. "Charlie?" Tealc asked. Jack nodded. "Come on T, we're waiting. I know you've waited a long time to say this." "I. DIE. FREE!"

Years later, after the stargate program was revealed to the world, a monument was built to the first SG1. It was four people, three men and a woman sitting around a mess hall table, laughing.


End file.
